Syncing Breeze Calendars With External Calendars

Synchronize your Breeze Calendars seamlessly with external calendars using this comprehensive guide. Whether you're integrating with Google Calendar, Outlook, or other platforms, this article provides step-by-step instructions for hassle-free syncing. Enhance collaboration and streamline scheduling by ensuring your Breeze Calendars are always up-to-date across all your devices and platforms. Explore now to optimize your calendar management and improve efficiency in coordinating church events and activities.

Breeze to External Calendar

You are able to have the events on your Breeze calendar show up on any external calendar that can read an iCal URL feed (Google Calendar, Apple Calendar, Outlook, etc). If you're using our multiple calendars feature, each calendar will have its own iCal address, allowing you to share only the events you choose. Breeze iCal feeds will display events for around 1 year from the current date.

To add your Breeze calendar events to an external Calendar:

1. Within Breeze, select the "Events" tab from the top right.
2. Click the gear icon next to "Add Event" and choose "Calendar Integration" from the dropdown menu.
3. Click the "Breeze → External Calendar" button.
4. Copy the URL for the Breeze calendar you wish to include on your external calendar.
5. Go to your external calendar (Google Calendar, Apple Calendar, etc) and provide the URL in the appropriate field. 

Google (& Android) Calendar Instructions

1. Navigate to your Google Calendar.
2. On the left, click the plus sign to "Add other calendars."
3. Select "From URL," paste your Breeze iCal calendar URL and click "Add Calendar."

Apple Calendar Instructions

1. Navigate to your Apple Calendar.
2. On the top toolbar, select "File > New Calendar Subscription..."
3. Provide your Breeze iCal calendar URL.

iPhone/iPad Instructions

1. On your mobile iOS device, navigate to "Settings > Accounts & Passwords > Add Account."
2. Select "Other" from the bottom of the list.
3. Select "Add Subscribed Calendar."
4. Provide your Breeze iCal calendar URL.

External Calendar to Breeze

Breeze can read any iCal URL feed (the iCal format is a popular calendar format). If you're using a calendar that provides an iCal address (such as Google Calendar or Apple Calendar), you can have that calendar show up in a read-only format on your Breeze Calendar. Read-only means that the calendar will not allow for edits on the Breeze-end and will not work for volunteers or check-in purposes. It is simply a way to keep all events together on one calendar. To do so:

1. Within Breeze, select the "Events" tab from the top right.
2. Click the gear icon next to "Add Event" and choose "Calendar Integration" from the dropdown menu.
3. Click the "Breeze ← External Calendar" button.
4. Provide your external calendar's iCal URL 

Google Calendar (& Android) Instructions

1. Navigate to your Google Calendar.
2. Click the gear symbol at the top
3. Choose "Settings" from the dropdown
4. Click Settings for My Calendar
5. Select the calendar you're wanting to sync
6. Select "Integrate calendar" on the left.
7. Look for the gray row titled "Public address in iCal format" OR "Secret address in iCal Format," select the URL and copy it. (To use the "Public Address", the box "Make available to Public" must be checked under the "Access Permissions for Events" section.  If this is not checked, use the "Secret Address".)
8. Paste that URL Link in to Breeze

Apple Calendar (& iPhone/iPad) Instructions

1. Navigate to your Apple Calendar.
2. Control-click (or right click) the calendar on the left panel and from the dropdown select "Share Calendar."
3. Click the "Public Calendar" checkbox and then use the web address displayed below to enter into Breeze.¹
   

Outlook Calendar (Office 365)

1. Navigate to Settings
2. Under Settings, select Calendar
3. Under Calendar, you should be able to options to Share Calendar or Publish Calendar
4. Under the Publish Calendar option you'll see HTML or iCal
5. Select iCal

Other Calendars

The iCal format Breeze uses is the main calendar standard making it easy to include calendars from many different sources on your Breeze calendar. While the process for obtaining the iCal address differs from program to program, once you find the address you'll be able to add it into your Breeze calendar. Example addresses that you're free to use can be found at https://www.webcal.guru/en-US/today

Removing an External Calendar

To remove an external calendar, please see the "Delete Calendar" steps within the Multiple Calendars section.

Syncing Frequency

When integrating an external calendar with Breeze, the calendars will stay in sync as changes are made; however, that synchronization will not necessarily happen immediately. If these changes were instant, a lot of website owners would be unhappy with Google, Apple, or any other calendar company for constantly bombarding their server, looking for calendar updates (not to mention it being a potentially slower experience navigating the calendar as you'd have to wait for the external calendar to provide data).

To avoid this problem, calendar companies synchronize their calendars periodically. While we're not able to control the syncing frequency of other companies, we've done our best to outline them below.